Savanna Seals $510M Refinance for 5 Bryant Park 

The year is drawing to a close, but some companies are still busy tying bows on deals before 2026 comes around.

Savanna just closed a $510 million refinance for its office property at 5 Bryant Park, the firm told Commercial Observer. 

King Street Capital Management and Blue Owl Capital provided the floating-rate loan, while Eastdil Secured’s Rob Turner, Grant Frankel, Ethan Pond and Drew Ahlers negotiated the deal. 

The debt retires the building’s existing $463 million commercial mortgage-backed securities (CMBS) loan and allows Savanna to continue to advance leasing at the 34-story tower, at a time when office leasing momentum is red hot in the Bryant Park market. 

PERE Credit first reported the deal was in the works in late November.

Savanna acquired the 680,000-square-foot building seven years ago for $640 million from Blackstone. The firm got to work in undertaking a full lobby and entrance renovation in 2020, adding onto the approximately $107 million in upgrades that have been completed at the building since 2007.

“We purchased the asset in 2018 and Savanna, at that time, saw a lot of the positive attributes that we’re continuing to see today, in that it’s a really great building on a corner location overlooking Bryant Park. Importantly, it’s proximate to all the three main transportation hubs of New York City — Grand Central, Port Authority and Penn Station,” Cooper Kramer, chief investment officer at Savanna, told CO. “We’ve had a view that well-located, well-transported buildings will perform well over time, and it’s been providing a particularly good tenant experience and tenant value.” 

Savanna saw strong and steady tenant demand, rent growth and performance at the asset from 2018 and even post-pandemic, with the firm renewing some of the building’s larger tenants between 2021 and 2023. “Seeing that performance, even during what was such a challenging time market-wide, really gave us the initial conviction that this is a building we wanted to continue to shepherd and to own, because we saw a lot of positive aspects of the deal,” Kramer said. 

The asset is in Savanna Real Estate Fund IV, a closed-end, private equity-backed fund. Its investors agreed to extend the fund’s life because the group saw the additional income growth that’s anticipated in the next few years, and the additional value that Savanna can generate through its business plan. 

“That was the backdrop for why we decided to refinance instead of sell,” Kramer said. “We see a stable and strengthening office market that we wanted to meet and to eventually see value creation through.” 

Even before the deal closed on Dec. 5, the firm was in discussions with several of the building’s existing tenants, plus some new potential tenants. Savanna’s Brian Reiver and CBRE’s Paul Amrich and Neil King are leading leasing and readying themselves for an active year in 2026.

“Demand is the strongest we’ve seen since 2019,” Kramer said, adding that the building’s diverse tenant roster includes small finance firms and family offices, a large fashion company that occupies four floors, an architectural firm, and several tech companies that are currently looking to grow. 

The new loan will retire the existing CMBS loan but also be used to build a second-floor amenity center and tackle tenant improvements and for tenant lease-up. The building is currently 80 percent leased, and Savanna expects occupancy to increase to north of 95 percent in 2026. 

When it came to selecting lenders, Kramer said one characteristic remained especially important.

“Having experienced what we all experienced for the past five years, of market uncertainty, turmoil [and] interest rate movements, flexibility is a key aspect that we look to when we decide on partners and lenders and financing providers,” he said.” It was paramount that we had lenders who were able to be thoughtful about our business plan and to give the flexibility for us to achieve it. The certain things we know in this world are that whatever you underwrite, there will be changes to it for the better and for the worse, and to be able to have an active dialog and direct conversations with Blue Owl and King Street was very important to us.” 

The lenders’ saw plenty of potential in the tower, too. 

“We’re excited to partner with Blue Owl and Savanna in this comprehensive recapitalization of 5 Bryant Park, which is poised to benefit from the ongoing strength in the prime Manhattan office market,” Mark Van Zandt, co-head of real estate at King Street, said in a statement. “Our investment in 5 Bryant Park continues an active year for King Street’s U.S. real estate special situations strategy, which seeks to provide bespoke and flexible financing solutions to owners of high-quality real estate assets.”

“Our investment in 5 Bryant Park reflects Blue Owl’s confidence in a vibrant New York City office market,” Jesse Hom, chief investment officer for Blue Owl’s real assets platform, said. “We see steadily improving fundamentals and strong demand for well located, Class A, urban office space, and continue to look for opportunities to support the market recovery.”

Looking ahead, Savanna is bullish on New York City’s office sector. 

“We believe the leasing market and the tenant demand in New York City will continue to be robust into 2026,” Kramer said. “There are a lot of large deals that we’ve all heard about, but the vast majority of deals that are done in New York City are those smaller tenants, 20,000 to 40,000 square feet, and we’re seeing a very strong demand in that size range. We are absolutely going to be active in looking at new acquisitions in 2026, and we have high conviction in New York City office as an asset class that will perform well.” 

Indeed, the firm also acquired 799 Broadway for $255 million last year.  

And, while Savanna may have just closed a half-billion deal in the midst of holiday festivities in New York City, it’s not quite done for the year. 

“From the moment we started closing, we have been talking to Blue Owl and King Street about some large expansions of tenants in the building,” Kramer said. “We’re talking to tenants on six  different floors in the building about expanding and potentially welcoming new tenants into the building. We’re very focused on leasing portfolio-wide. So that’s definitely going to be a focus as we round out 2025 and into 2026. As far as new acquisitions go, we’re always keeping an eye on the market, and we’re excited about continuing to look at new opportunities.” 

Cathy Cunningham can be reached at cunningham@commercialobserver.com.